Been busy with ABS Upgrade, etc so slow in responding….
First of all, the important warning.
Removing the cooling fan assy without scratching inside the eng bay would be quite challenging while keeping surrounding parts such as Eng Loom, brackets, pipes, etc in place.
The unique shape of the silver metal housing and the protruded housing brackets/feet will force you to rotate the fan assy at specific angle before you can take it out of the bay.
Shifting the Eng loom to get extra space will help but still, you need really good protection inside the eng bay to prevent any scratches.
If you use eng cover, you won't notice the scratch from outside but I hate any damages even when they might be hidden.....
Try it and you will know what I'm talking about…..
For the points you mentioned, following photo should help.
The red one is mine with the original cooling fan removed.
The black one left the factory without the cooling fan fitted (fan-less) so good example on how it's done.
1. Fuel pipe
The actual shape of the fuel return pipe is different between the two models.
The blue arrow is the fixing bolt hole that is at the same position between the two.
As marked in yellow, with the fan-less model, the pipe stays straight right up to the pipe clamp.
You could replace the pipe to the fan-less spec, take bit more adventurous approach to modify the original pipe shape or just use the cable tie like mine.
The nearby Eng Loom is very thick and secured by the harness clamp sitting very close.
I just secure the pipe to the thick loom using the cable tie positioned at the yellow arrow.
The cable tie is in black colour so you can't see it but it's there.
2. RPM pickup, fan & relay connectors
With the fan-less model, the rpm pickup was just taped to the Eng Loom.
As there was no cooling fan from the beginning, no fan or relay connectors so nothing to show in the photo.
If you remove the cooling fan, you can deal with them like this.
You don't want moisture entering the connector terminal so please use self amalgamating tape or something similar to seal the opening.
One important message.
Please disconnect the fan relay and leave it on the cooling fan housing so that it will be out of the bay after the fan removal.
The relay has rubber like splash proof cover when initially installed on the cooling fan housing.
After the removal of the fan and if the relay was kept connected with the rubber cover opening pointing upwards, it acts as a nice 'cup' trapping the water over long period.
Eventually, it will corrode the relay terminal and cause latched short circuit.
This will result in several issues.
You will find several owners on here experiencing the A/C CCU staying powered up even after completely removing the IG Key out of the key cyl.
In US, super charger application is popular and that requires the removal of the cooling fan assy.
Some of the installation left the relay being connected.
Quite often, you will see it hanging down inside the bay with the rubber cover opening upwards.
I re-created the same issue on purposely to take this photo and all you need is a short circuit at this relay connector.
No IG key yet CCU and blower motor are still operating.....
3. TH cable clamp
It's just a standalone parts and not welded/fixed to the fan housing.
Just use one of the bolt that came with the cooling fan and install it at the original position but without the fan housing.
By the way, there are metal collar and rubber base where the fan housing fixing bolt sits.
May become handy for future project so keep them.
Kaz
